Flight Gear 3.0 Final was released!

[jcomm 5,919]

 

 

 

 

 

[tsa737 6]

what is this software?

[jcomm 5,919]

what is this software?

 

www.flightgear.org

[Mountain Man 142]

Apparently TerraSync is supposed to work "out of the box" now with no need for user configuration.  I hope that's true because I could never get it to work before.

[jcomm 5,919]

Apparently TerraSync is supposed to work "out of the box" now with no need for user configuration.  I hope that's true because I could never get it to work before.

 

Yes, it's working great now, and brings you the new V2 Scenery too :-) - a very plausible presentation of different parts of the World.

 

Each time you ask for an area not already in your cache, it'll get downloaded automatically. If the database suffers any updates, even areas you already have in cache will

be reloaded.

 

For me it is as good as I can ask, specially not having to pay a single cent for it.... And... I do prefer the autogen to what I get for instance in default X-Plane 10...

[Murmur 3,941]

Yes, it's working great now, and brings you the new V2 Scenery too :-) - a very plausible presentation of different parts of the World.

 

For me it is as good as I can ask, specially not having to pay a single cent for it.... And... I do prefer the autogen to what I get for instance in default X-Plane 10...

 

???

 

 

[jcomm 5,919]

Well... not everywhere :blush:

 

Here's Paris:

 

 

[Jimmy RFR 406]

Some nice screens, along with a few not-so-nice ones!  Looks like an issue with dependance on OSM for vector info to me, but to be honest I can't recall where FG gets it's vector data from.

 

In my opinion, what FG needs is to have someone come up with a method of applying a method of applying an uneven edge to adjoining vectors, along the same method that FSX uses for it's landclass textures.  Seeing those perfectly straight vector lines with 45 or 90 degree angles is very visually jarring to me.

 

That said though, I always take the time to check out and see the latest whenever I hear of an FG update. ^_^

[Mountain Man 142]

 

 

Yes, it's working great now...

 

I still seem to be having some problems.  When I go to my home airport, the game indicates that it's downloading data, but then it eventually stops and I'm stuck on the loading screen.  The default area works fine, but anywhere else isn't working so well.

[HiFlyer 9,358]

I'll give it a shot (again) Jcomm. Every time I've tried FlightGear in the past, I ended up running away very quickly, but maybe this time will be the charm.

[jcomm 5,919]

I'll give it a shot (again) Jcomm. Every time I've tried FlightGear in the past, I ended up running away very quickly, but maybe this time will be the charm.

 

I wish you are more lucky than my friend Tercio, who, just like you, has installed each and every version, for a few seconds... just to try to see why I am so positive about it :-)

 

Anyway, Tercio has a serious problem - an ATI card, and it's lousy OpenGL....

 

I confess that this time, either because of the better effects overall, Scenery v2 with Terrasync running smoothly, etc..., is turning this sim into my preferred one, at the moment... But then again, don't forget that I look at aspects that are of no interest to many simmers, and tend to forgive limitations where most simmers look for perfection / plausibility... Knowing you, and what you really like to see in terms of graphics, I'm afraid your test is not going to live long enough :-/

 

Just a few notes ...

 

When starting FG3, make sure you look at the following menus. Adapt the rendering options to your hardware and options.

Also, please take some time to at least download the following aircraft:

 

- Cap10B and C, and DR-400 from here

- The Constellation and the 707s from here

 

 

[HiFlyer 9,358]

At the download speeds I'm seeing, I'll have to let you know how it goes sometime next year! :blink:

 

And yes I very much like graphics, but what I really like is balance, and the feeling that I'm really there. It just seems to me that sometimes the hobby has gotten so lost in the instrumentation and alphabet soup, that everything else takes a back seat; suffering accordingly. (which is a real shame when current technology offers the possibility of both)

 

Like all extremes, when you go too far one way or another, you lose the majority in the middle, which this hobby sometimes seems to be determined to do.

 

And thanks for the tip J.C, I'll download everything in sight. ^_^

[Murmur 3,941]

Probably the more balanced sim is FSX, all the others being "skewed" towards a subset of features. But I can see why Jcomm likes FlightGear, there are a lot of things in which it is really accurate, for example flight instrumentation. Or the position of sun/moon (I verified that the sunrise/sunset times are precise to the second!).

 

As Jcomm already noted, the atmosphere/weather modeling is the most advanced by far that you can find anywhere. I guess neither professional civil or military simulators have such a complex weather modeling.

 

The main thing holding it back IMO are the graphics. Maybe not so much the engine in itself, but rather the shortage of hi-quality art assets, compared to FSX/P3D/X-Plane.

[Jimmy RFR 406]

Well, my interest last night went from casual, to 'I must try the new version out'. :lol:

 

They have at least made the menus a bit easier to navigate through, but it didn't help that I still had 2.x installed - that seemed to mess things up seriously for me.  I had to un-install, clean out config files and re-install before it would load up properly for me.  That's not their fault though!

 

I played around for a few hours last night, mostly messing with settings to achieve a balance between visuals and performance.  Interestingly, my 780ti card doesn't seem to account for much, very easy for me to bring my system down to the low teens.  Not sure which settings are the real performance killers yet, but high levels of vegetation are certainly one of them!!

 

Jcomm, I really appreciate you posting those screenshots of your settings, I'll have to go back through mine and try them out.

 

 

 

The main thing holding it back IMO are the graphics. Maybe not so much the engine in itself, but rather the shortage of hi-quality art assets, compared to FSX/P3D/X-Plane.

 

That's definitely the case.  As neat as some of the shaders are (the adjustable altitude and density of snow cover is really cool!), the ground textures are very hit and miss.  Some are really nice, on par with the big boys, some are very, er, 'plain'. ^_^

 

However, for me the ground visuals aren't as immersion breaking as VC visuals are, and it's nice that a few of the planes available have made some big strides in this area.  That DR400 is very nice, and I want to check that 707 out for sure.  It is nice to see how deep the systems are modeled on a lot of these planes too.

 

It will definitely be something to spend some more time with, perhaps while I wait for P3Dv2 to further mature, or at least for the 3rd party development for that sim to mature.

 

Anyone have any good helicopter recommendations?  Preferably with a half-decent VC to go along with a decent flight model?

[jcomm 5,919]

 

 

Anyone have any good helicopter recommendations?

 

Both the EC130 and 135 are nice, and the 130 already uses JSBSim.

 

There are a few other projects, but I couldn't manage to extract them from the GIT repository so far :-/

[Jimmy RFR 406]

 

 

Both the EC130 and 135 are nice, and the 130 already uses JSBSim.

 

Shall give them a whirl (pun intended ^_^ ), thanks for the recommendations.